The Diffusion of Business Blogs in Japan
March 17 (Friday) 2006
Satoshi Hamaya
Research Fellow
SUMMARY
- When blogs first appeared on the Japanese Internet scene, their user-friendly and chronologically oriented information display functions were used primarily as a tool for making personal diaries. When they were first used by businesses as well, their role was, for the most part, limited to company presidents' diaries or press releases-in other words, comparatively simple information sharing. Recently, however, many companies are using blogs as a marketing tool.
The First Blog Used for Marketing by a Major Company
The first case of a major Japanese company actively using blogs to promote its products was Nissan Motor's “TIIDA BLOG”. The concept of the Tiida automobile was “Compact Luxury”, and it was an extremely important vehicle for Nissan, perhaps even the most important automobile since the Nissan “Sunny”, which was a very successful compact car. The TIIDA BLOG site was launched simultaneously with the vehicle's announcement in September 2004. It included the same ability to freely manipulate 3-D images of the vehicle as could be found on the official website, but it also featured rich information that could not be readily expressed in the product specs of the official homepage or catalog, such as the feel of the seats, the sensation of space within the vehicle and other elements. The TIIDA BLOG site was able to use the blog format to present this information from a perspective similar to that of a customer's.
Following the release of the TIIDA BLOG, Nissan developed similar blogs for the X-Trail (SUV) and Safari (off-road vehicle). Fujifilm took up the blog format as well, creating a “NATURA BLOG” (for its film cameras), as did Ricoh with its “GR BLOG” (for its digital cameras). Since Nissan's TIIDA BLOG, there has been an increasing number of blogs used for promoting products with strong degrees of customer interaction like those mentioned above.
The Main Features of Blogs as Business Tools
The reason for the current proliferation of business blogs is tied to their difference from conventionally used, static communication tools, such as traditional websites and mail magazines. Specifically, blogs possess the following four merits:
- Ease of Update: Blogs are both easy-to-use tools for individuals and a simple way to make websites. In other words, a blog can be used as a CMS (Contents Management System). Since updating blogs does not require one to go through the trouble of hiring an outside design service, blogs offer a particularly strong merit for small and medium-sized companies that lack specialist technicians.
- Ability to Attract Customers: Blogs feature trackback and automatic update alert functions (RSS), and the large number of inbound links increases the blog's SEO (Search Engine Optimization). This means that the webpage garners a higher position in search engine results, and thus can be viewed easily by a large number of people. Furthermore, the RSS (Rich Site Summary) information update alert function eliminates the need to wait for users to visit the site, instead making it possible to conduct push-style information transmission.
- Information Transmission from the Reader's Perspective: As they were originally used by individuals, blogs allow the writer's voice to be heard easily, in contrast to the static formality of standard official websites. Readers are able to put a “face” to the company representative, which allows them to feel closer to the contents of the information. For the writer as well, blogs provide the ability to express information that is otherwise hard to present numerically, such as vehicle or camera performance, in a free and unfettered format.
- Interactive Communication: Blogs are adapted for interactive communication that far surpasses that of conventional, static websites through the comment and trackback functions. Fujifilm's NATURA BLOG made use of the trackback function in a photograph contest for pictures taken with the Natura. Additionally, unlike comments or anonymous BBS (Bulletin Board System), trackback makes it easy to identify the source of information, which gives the information a higher sense of reliability. As a result, it is possible to gather the voices of consumers through the trackback function and use this information to inspire product development.
The Importance of Company-wide Support Systems and Risk Management
Of course, there are also limits and points to remember when using blogs for business. First, just because blogs are technically easy to update, this does not mean that the content of updated information will grow. Depending on the product, there may be an insufficient amount of information to relay to readers, and there are more than a few cases where lack of information makes it impossible to update a blog. Because blogs allow readers to catch the latest information in a quick glimpse, if old information is left un-updated the blog may in fact communicate a negative image. Company-wide support from developer to seller is necessary to gather the information required to update a blog and to prevent it from being run exclusively by one particular department, like the PR office.
Just like other forms of media used for promotion, it is difficult to quantifiably measure the direct effect of blogs on sales. In the case of Nissan and Fujifilm, however, according to information gained from the sales floor and other sources, representatives feel a definite connection between their companies' blogs and sales. When assessing the impact of blogs, however, contribution to sales should not be the sole factor considered. It is also important to combine quantifiable indicators such as page views, click rates, and trackback tallies in order to qualitatively grasp the effect of blogs on other aspects, such as developer morale or company and product image.
Furthermore, using blogs does not necessarily render official websites and mail magazines unnecessary. Using official websites to offer less-updated, accurate information and mail magazines to provide customized information attuned to customers' attributes is one effective way to divide their functions. Another way to share roles would be to use blogs for presale promotion to prospective customers, and to take advantage of SNS (Social Networking Services) for retaining existing customers.
Lastly, the interactive communication offered by blogs could, depending on the circumstance, become a medium for spreading a negative image of a company or product. Many companies attempt to control communications by employing trackback functions instead of using anonymous commenting functions to pinpoint the source of information. Even in this way, there are also risks when using interactive functions for business blogs. However, it should be possible to enjoy the merits of interactive communication by paying close attention to ex-ante design and to the ex-post response to information transmission while conducting watchful risk management.
